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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24893524">Concern Isn't Love</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/May1974/pseuds/May1974'>May1974</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Swagger Bishie Collection [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Danny Phantom</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Denial, Gay, M/M, Not Beta Read, One-Shot, Soulmate AU, danny dies and dash isn't happy, danny phantom - Freeform, dash is confused, implied star and paulina, please help these boys, soul marks, swagger bishie</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 01:40:39</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,676</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24893524</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/May1974/pseuds/May1974</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>No one can know. Dash thinks it's wrong. He thinks it's a defect. Up until he realizes he actually cares.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Dash Baxter/Danny Fenton</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Swagger Bishie Collection [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1792732</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>218</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Concern Isn't Love</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Another soulmate AU! Ugh, this idea hit me out of nowhere, and I had to get it out. I don't think I've written from Dash's perspective before, but I tried a new style. Advice and feedback is welcome!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>■●■●■●■</p><p>
  <strong>Concern Isn’t Love</strong>
</p><p>Soul marks were vague, but everyone had one. Everyone was born with a single soul mark, whether their soulmate existed yet or not, and they lived with that mark until the day they died. Even then, there were many who believed that it carried on in the afterlife, and that you and your soulmate would never part, even when met with death.</p><p>No one knew how or why soul marks existed. Once, long ago, it was ingrained in human culture. No other animal had soul marks like them. Humans were unique in more ways than one, but the secret of the magic behind soul marks was lost through the centuries. No one questioned it anymore, and it was accepted as a reality, even as the magic and supernatural in the rest of the world seeped back into the ground and dissipated. Even when the last unicorn had retreated within the feral tide of the sea, and when the last spirit had been sealed away in the twisted knots of the oaks, soul marks remained. And no one ever questioned their soul mark.</p><p>Dash Baxter wasn’t just anyone, though.</p><p>He seriously thought his soul mark was a defect.</p><p>A soul mark was a figure or image that somehow represented your soulmate. It didn’t give away their name, or nationality, or gender, or anything decidedly important to know. It was frustrating. And your soulmate had a mark that represented you. And even though it shouldn’t make sense, as soon as you saw your soulmate’s mark, you knew. Something clicked. Some people claimed to know who their soulmate was without even looking at their mark, but Dash dismissed those falsehoods.</p><p>His soul mark was stupid. It was half a moon. It wasn’t even the comical crescent moon, or a full moon; it was literally a semi-circle with weird blotches, the only thing that defined it as the moon. As long as Dash had been old enough to understand what the mark on his wrist meant, he had studied it, and he knew with certainty that it was half a moon.</p><p>But why?</p><p>Who the fuck was represented by half a moon?</p><p>Soul marks were vague – and Dash knew this better than most – but this was ridiculous. Unless his soulmate was secretly an alien, or was destined to land on the moon, it meant nothing. His friends had soul marks that made more sense.</p><p>Paulina, whom he had known forever, had the mathematical symbol of pi. Her soulmate very obviously was going to be good with numbers or be some sort of math genius.</p><p>Kwan, his best buddy, had a treble clef symbol on his wrist. His soulmate would be musical.</p><p>What the fuck did half a moon mean?</p><p>It still didn’t click for Dash when he was beating on Danny Fenton, and he caught sight of his wrist, and a sudden shock ran through him. It was nothing special. On his wrist was his soul mark, a pair of feathered wings. It meant absolutely nothing to Dash, and yet – he <em>knew</em>. He suddenly knew.  </p><p>After that, he and Danny made a pack. Because suddenly Danny knew, too, and Dash was panicking because his soulmate was a dude – and for fucks sake, it was Danny Fenton, of all people. Most people didn’t meet their soulmates this early. They were in seventh grade when it happened. For the rest of seventh, and following into eighth, they avoided each other.</p><p>This pack followed them into high school, too.</p><p>Dash didn’t relent on his bullying. He feared that if he stopped, then the others would know, and that was something that could not happen. Danny never said anything about <em>it</em> – and Dash was thankful, even though he hated his soulmate with a passion. But Danny began to retaliate. He grew a backbone out of nowhere. He would throw snide remarks at Dash. He would goad Dash. He fed into Dash’s bullying, and Dash wasn’t sure whether he was grateful or not.</p><p>But they never told anyone, and they never spoke about it. Dash knew that not even the freak’s loser friends, Goth Girl and Techno Geek, knew about it. He made sure of that.</p><p>But then something happened.</p><p>He’s lying in bed, deep asleep, when it happens.</p><p>And suddenly he’s bolting upright in bed, his wrist on fire, his head on fire, his body on fire. And everything hurts. But his wrist – his wrist is burning, is numb, hurts more than anything, like his hand is being sawed off. Then he’s screaming, shocks running through his body, and it seems like forever before the pain melts away and Dash is left on the floor, tangled in his bedsheets. He was sore from falling and thrashing about, but his wrist hurts even more. His left wrist, where his soul mark was, because stupid Danny Fenton was left-handed.</p><p>His eyes trace his flushed red skin to his wrist, too afraid to look, before he finally sucks it up. And his heart nearly stops.</p><p>He had heard the stories, of course.</p><p>But he never –</p><p>He never thought.</p><p>His soul mark, usually a stark black against his skin, was faded and grey.</p><p>His soulmate was dead.</p><p>Danny Fenton was dead.</p><p>■●■●■●■</p><p>On Monday he walks to school in a daze. He couldn’t tell anybody because then they would <em>know</em>. But news and rumors were bound to spread, and soon enough, Dash would have to hear the truth. He would have to hear the truth despite already knowing, and he would have to act surprised. He might show some concern, but he would never have the grief that came from true love. His soul mark was a defect, after all.</p><p>He kept telling himself that as he walked the halls, numb and unfeeling and confused. But then he rounded the corner and his eyes suddenly found the loser trio.</p><p><em>Trio</em>.</p><p>Dash almost has a heart attack, again.</p><p>Danny Fenton, who was dead, was standing at his lockers as if he had never died.</p><p>That didn’t make sense.</p><p>And before he can even stop himself, he’s barreling straight through the horde of brain-dead zombies, and picking Fenton up by the collar of his shirt and is shoving him up against the lockers. He’s pretty sure he’s glaring daggers despite feeling weak and sick. His stomach churns.</p><p>“You better fucking explain,” he hisses.</p><p>Fenton’s loser friends put up a protest, and beat uselessly at his back, but he doesn’t let go. They didn’t know. Not only did they not know, they also didn’t <em>know</em>. They couldn’t possibly know Danny Fenton was dead, because he was right here in front of them, and they didn’t have the faded soul mark to show for it. Briefly, he swears his soul mark heats up with a shock. He ignores it.</p><p>Danny gasps, as if this isn’t their normal, and suddenly he looks scared. Real scared. His impossibly blue eyes dart around anxiously. “Dash, we aren’t supposed to do this here.”</p><p>Dash understands.</p><p>He respects Fenton for honouring their pack despite his momentary loss of sense.</p><p>Slowly, he lowers the freak to the ground, but he quickly slams his fist into the metal beside his head as a warning. Danny flinches, as always, and for a second he’s no longer there. Dash probably blinks too slowly, but he swears that Fenton suddenly disappears.</p><p>But no, he’s there, standing in front of him, blue eyes wide with fear. Dash harshly jabs him in the chest with the hand without the soul mark. “After school, behind the bleachers. Be there.”</p><p>■●■●■●■</p><p>He almost doesn’t expect the loser to show up. But he does, and Dash doesn’t question it, because maybe the freak is just as confused as him. Though, the moment he sees how anxious and scared Fenton is, he realizes that he knows what’s going on. He <em>knows</em> what happened.</p><p>“Dash,” he tries. He stops. He backtracks. “I … I’m guessing, maybe, that you …”</p><p>Without a word, Dash roughly yanks his sleeve up. He had taken to wearing his letterman jacket religiously when he realized who his soulmate was. No one else <em>knew</em>, but it always felt like Dash had to cover something shameful. Now, he had to wear it for another reason. He grits his teeth. He had also taken to avoiding the soul mark when possible. He liked looking at the grey even less than the black it used to be, and he doesn’t know why.</p><p>“You died,” he says, because that’s all he knew to say. How else was he supposed to explain what happened? What else explained his soul mark?</p><p>Fenton flinches.</p><p>His eyes are too blue. His ears suddenly look too long. His teeth look too sharp.</p><p>Is he even human anymore?</p><p>He’s dead.</p><p>Maybe he’s a spirit.</p><p>He swallows. “Um, that was an accident.”</p><p>“<em>An accident</em>,” Dash parrots, voice harsh. Why was Fenton still here? He had just confirmed his death, and yet there he was, standing in the physical world and still being very real. Why had he not passed on yet? Had Dash somehow managed to get a defected soul mark and a demented soulmate? He doesn’t know what else to say. Neither does his soulmate, apparently. They both stand in silence.</p><p>But then Fenton flickers. He disappears. And this time, Dash knows it’s not a trick of the light. He knows he didn’t blink wrong. Fenton literally disappears. He winks out of existence.</p><p>And then he’s back.</p><p>Standing there, face red as he realizes what happened, and then turns even redder when he realizes that Dash <em>saw</em> and <em>knew</em> what happened.</p><p>“What the fuck?” He asks, because what else could he say?</p><p>Danny bites his lower lip, and his teeth are definitely too sharp, when he says, “You can’t tell anyone.”</p><p>Even if Dash can’t love his soulmate, that doesn’t mean he can’t feel concerned. ‘You can't tell anyone’ – those were the words he had told Fenton years ago, when they made the pack.</p><p>But Dash knows how to keep a secret.</p><p>And now he <em>knows</em>.</p><p>■●■●■●■</p><p> </p>
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